The MTN/FAZ Champions Zesco United have said they disappointed in National team manager Lusekelo Kamwambi over is outburst.Mr Kamwambi was quoted in today’s papers blaming the Ndola giants over the transfer of the Zambian Player of the year Winston Kalengo to Congolese giants AC Leopards.

The club has revealed that Kalengo was given a signing fee of $ 70 000 (K700 000) and will earn $10 000 (K100 000) per month .Zesco offered him a new contract with professional terms and offered him a permanent job at the company but opted for the almost irresistible AC Leopards deal.

THE FULL STATEMENT BELOW:
Zesco United would like to express its disappointment in National Team manager Lusekelo Kamwambi’s outburst on the
transfer of striker Winston Kalengo to AC Leopards of Congo Brazzaville as reported in today 03rd January,2016 editions of the
Sunday Mail and Sunday Times of Zambia.

This is not the first time Kamwambi in his capacity is rushing to the media to condemn
Zesco United, last May he accused us of refusing to release players even when he knew we had midweek games to play.

As a club, we do not deal with Kamwambi in any correspondence because there are senior and higher offices that we communicate to at the Football Association of Zambia (FAZ), in this case the issue of Kalengo’s transfer has been discussed with the General Secretary, George Kasengele and the President Kalusha Bwalya who have the
knowledge about the transfer and the efforts the club put in to stop Kalengo from traveling.

The two senior FAZ officials have at no time rushed to the media to condemn neither the player nor the club, so to us Kamwambi’s
outbursts are baseless and he seems to be talking about a deal he has no or little knowledge about.

The Club did not want to go in details of the Kalengo transfer but since Kamwambi has gone to the press, we will lay down the facts
as follows;

Before Kalengo traveled to Congo, he was granted permission to go and negotiate his transfer by the National Team and Zesco United coach George Lwandamina and
immediately the deal was finalized the first person he called was the coach.

The head coach then called ZUFC team manager Mabvuto Banda and requested that Kalengo be removed from the CAF list because he had signed a new contract.
Upon signing the one year contract Kalengo was paid about USD 70,000 as signing fee and was offered a salary of about USD
10,000,Kalengo then contacted the ZUFC to formalize his transfer since he had already made a decision to leave the club.

Prior to leaving, ZUFC had engaged Kalengo who had only two months left to his contract to revise his contract and add the
following conditions;
-To give him a professional contract like foreigners at the club
-To give him permanent employment at Zesco Limited to sustain his future.

Unfortunately both offers were turned down by Kalengo who said he wanted to look at other offers (from Saudi-Arabia which was only for four months and AC
Leopards which he settled for) before making a decision. We wish to categorically state that no club from the South African PSL
or anywhere else gave Kalengo any offer. It is quite surprising and disappointing that the National team technical bench led by
George Lwandamina can condemn the Kalengo transfer when he travelled with the blessing and permission from the coach, it
was in their power not to grant the player permission to travel for negotiations.

We wish to put it on record that as a club we put in our best negotiations with the player but unfortunately AC Leopards beat
us to the conditions as the only consolation we had was to offer him permanent employment which he was not ready to take
for now.

We hope that these utterances by
Kamwambi do not have the blessings of FAZ because they have the capability of bringing
the relationship of Zesco United and the Association in disrepute.

Kamwambi should realize that the club has come to the aid of FAZ at short notice because of the cordial relationship (that exists between FAZ and ZESCO). For example, Zesco has sacrificed the head coach to be at the National team while paying him his full salary and allowances as per his contract with the club and the use of the team bus and driver to transport visiting teams among other things.

We therefore feel undermined by the National team technical bench through Kamwambi’s utterances who should have just taken few steps to go to the coach’s room to get the full facts of the stated player transfer.

We wish to appeal FAZ to tame Kamwambi’s mouth as he is not the right person to be issuing statements on behalf the Association on matters he doesn’t understand on Zesco United.

Kamwambi should learn to consult and get facts before running to the media to be seen as the intelligent one.It is such people that are dragging the name of FAZ in the mud with their excitement.We wish to thank the FAZ President Kalusha
Bwalya and General secretary George
Kasengele for handling the matter
professionally and we hope to continue
working cordially in the year 2016.
Issued Jointly by
Justin Mumba – Club General Secretary
Katebe C Chengo (Ms) – Club Media Officer

Mubanga Aaron

Freelance Football Writer |Freelance sports presenter TV & Radio|Sports Analyst|Social media manager|mubajnrabntv@gmail.com